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New Relationship Status:

I’ve had a lot of friends ask since Joel proposed how did I know. I’ve known Joel my entire life, so there are a lot of shared secrets and personal moments that have tied our lives together. Many of which include many of our mutual friends. But what these friends really mean in this question is how did you know, despite everything you’ve been through, that he was the one. Because the people asking aren’t the ones that have been active around our relationship for the past 6 years. Because the people really close that saw, they knew.

But this post isn’t going to tell you when I knew I’d marry Joel. This post is rather a giant disclaimer that everything you see on my Facebook is a lie. Ok, that’s a bit dramatic, but still partially true. We live in this digital world where everything looks perfect, and we don’t really know each other anymore. We see updates on Facebook and Instagram and maybe a blog post or two, but unless you spend extracurricular time with a couple, you don’t really see the inter-workings behind their relationship anymore.

So, I’m just being honest and upfront about this on my blog, because I don’t want you to read anything on my blog and think that I have this perfect life or relationship that is some fairy tale. I can’t live up to those expectations, our relationship can’t live up to those expectations. Our relationship is flawed in many ways, but we love each other. And through the many events – fortunate and unfortunate – that we have been through since our first date back in 2010, we still have decided to take on the daunting task of cohabitation for life.

Note: This is not how I feel about living with a boy. This is how I feel about living with anyone.

I’d like to point out that our story did not come without bumps, curves or straight up do not enter caution tape. We all like to refer to relationships as “roller coasters” but we forget that roller coasters take months to design and build. Then they go through a series of tests to ensure it is built to proper safety codes and what not. Then, once riders are allowed on the roller coaster, it is not without its faults.

Sometimes it rides seamlessly and is full of fun and adventure.

Sometimes it stops right on its tracks then keeps moving.

Sometimes you have to stay on the ride even though your seat belt isn’t working because its going full speed.

And, sometimes the riders even have to get off for it to be repaired.

Honestly, roller coasters aren’t the best metaphor for relationships, but I’m not that great at coming up with metaphors. So this is what I’ll tell you about what I know thus far:

Relationships come with disagreements. They come with laughter, fun, adventure, and occasionally knock-down, drag-out fights. And mine and Joel’s relationship is not an exception to any of those conditions. There are things about Joel that make me absolutely crazy, and if you stick around long enough at the wedding or reception, you’ll probably see me roll my eyes at him once or twice. But the thing is, if Joel was some perfect guy, he wouldn’t be perfect for me because I’m not perfect. But we’ve chosen to somehow find our way imperfectly through this world together and neither of us know how to read a map. We’re going to get things wrong, and you may or may not hear about it. But sometimes, we’ll get things right too.

My point is, we didn’t get here by having a perfect relationship all the time. He keeps fresh flowers on my desk now, but I can tell you that was not the case back in 2010. We’ve grown up a lot in the past 6 years. Thankfully, he’s matured slightly since these days:

I’m confident that we’ll make it past the 72 day marriage expectation that Kim K has set for our generation. So, at the 72 day mark, we will celebrate because we’ll be more successful than Kim Kardashian.

But whether our marriage rolls out on national television (#dream) or in the privacy of our new two-bedroom apartment in Atlanta that I get to decorate before he moves in (#winning), I can tell you one thing: it won’t be perfect, but we’re gonna love each other through it all.

2 thoughts on “New Relationship Status:”

You may not be perfect, but you are amazing and inspirational. I only know you from your blog, and what I know is that you may be flawed, that those flaws are fine for life and are most likely different from my flaws and from your honey’s flaws. Congratulations on your engagement, and on the future together. I hope you plan on continuing your blog. If you don’t, (we,, if you do as well) I wish you MANY, MANY years of fun/laughs, eyerolls and love.